Innocence
by xxdeath.by.chocolatexx
Summary: //Falling in love is the thing the Dark Lord scorns the most. Maybe that's why Rodolphus did it.// Giftfic for Slytherite


**A/N** Here is a little Halloween present for you...it unintentionally ended up being a bit creepy, so that works out nicely...See my note at the bottom for some more details about the fic. Enjoy!

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Bella knows nothing of love, but she is overcome by it in her worship of her master, and she will follow his orders up until her death.

She is distraught when he arranges her to marry Rodolphus Lestrange, the handsome brute, but she holds her head proudly and walks up to the altar as if without a second thought.

Rodolphus is thrilled of course (who wouldn't be), the beautiful Bella is his, and only his. Oh Rodolphus, so innocent, so wrong.

Rodolphus is unaware that Bella is not satisfied, that she craves what she cannot have: the love of her master.

How could he know, when Bella refuses to show weakness, refuses to reveal that she feels even for a second what her master scorns so openly, hates so passionately. Love.

So Rodolphus continues to bed her as if she is a star-struck lover who believes that the planets revolve around her husband's very being. As if she is the innocent girl in a white dress to whom marriage is such a novelty that she must make it perfect.

Perhaps it would have worked, if Bella was not so bloodthirsty and evil and just plain crazy.

_Some people just want to watch the world burn._

It scares Rodolphus more than a little, when he takes her out on a mission to torture the Longbottoms. It frightens him to see the emptiness, the complete lack of pity in her eyes as she watches Alice writhe on the floor, obviously unknowing, unable to tell them anything.

He is not the only one watching her.

Rabastan is there, and Rabastan is not scared of Bella. It turns him on to see a woman as wicked as him, and he shudders with pleasure to think of what he could do to her before she would scream. Bella is not one to show weakness.

Rodolphus does not see the slight revulsion in her eyes as she tortures Frank _(they say she loved him once)_, but Rabastan sees the determination in her face as she drives him beyond the brink of sanity. Rodolphus is weak, he disapparates before she is finished.

She turns when she is done, and Rabastan smiles. _It begins_.

Such a sordid affair, such a sordid affair, the likes of which have rarely been seen. _With my own brother_, Rodolphus thinks, but then realizes that he is far too frightened of Bella to confront her, and so he turns his head not unlike a lamb before the slaughter, and continues his service to his Lord. _His loyalty is wavering…_

* * *

_Say what you want to say_

_Hang for your hollow ways_

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Bella is killing him day by day, because he has done the unthinkable. He has fallen in love with what he wants her to be, and she is not that. She is something else, and Rabastan is only exponentially increasing the evil in her.

She tastes of ashes, and her kisses are cold, but still he keeps her in his bed at night, if only to ensure that she is not in the bed across the hall, letting Rabastan pound her into the sheets, craving the torturous pain that Rodolphus is too gentle and in love to give her.

He never was meant to be a Death Eater.

Rodolphus realizes too late that he should not have turned a blind eye to Bellatrix's affair with his brother, for she is too proper to divorce him, but she can no longer spare him a second glance.

It disgusts him to see her at dinner, sweet-talking his own flesh and blood, and more than once he wonders who is playing who in this relationship. They both seem to be incarnations of evil, and neither seems capable of love.

Perhaps this is what drew them together.

Rodolphus no longer delights in causing pain to others, he knows his own pain now, and it is so deep. His innocence is tainted with the flesh of other humans on his hands, and their deaths now haunt him day and night.

His heart is not in the torture he inflicts, for his heart is somewhere wishing it was with Bella's. Bella's heart does not seem to exist. Perhaps it died long ago, along with her ability to love, the day she realized her potential, and channeled it into service to the Dark Lord.

For all Rodolphus is not meant to be a Death Eater, it seems to be what Bella was born to do.

Poor innocent Rodolphus, to believe for a moment that he could have forced Bella into something she didn't want. But how could he know she didn't want it?

The Dark Lord senses his loyalty wavering, he senses that Rodolphus has become a traitor to their cause by falling in _love_ (he spits the word to himself and tries to forget everything he knows about her).

He is waiting for an opportunity, and opportunity comes.

Rodolphus does not realize that Bella has given him away. She spoke with relish to his Lord about how he has not been fulfilling his duties, how he is letting the Muggles and Mudbloods off easy.

He is tortured, he is _Crucio_ed, and he is left on the floor. Nobody but Rabastan can hear him muttering, _It was her, it was Bella, she did this to me_. Rabastan smiles.

Green light fills the room, and Bella is free again.

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**A/N **This was a giftfic for Slytherite. The prompt was "innocence", and the pairing was Bellatrix/Rabastan. I realize I kind of screwed with the guidelines a bit here, because I made the story more from Rodolphus' point of view, and he was the one who was innocent. Meh, whatever, I like it. And just so you don't sue me/think I steal things without acknowledgment, the line "Some people just want to watch the world burn" is from...you guessed it, The Dark Knight. Also, the two lines in the middle, "Say what you want to say/Hang for your hollow ways" are from the song "Oh Comely" by Neutral Milk Hotel. Listen to the song if you can, it's amazing, regardless of Jeff Mangum's incapability to sing. So with those thoughts, I leave you. Enjoy your trick or treating if you are going, otherwise, if you are like me, enjoy scaring little kids and then giving them candy.

First two reviewers get to request fics!

death by chocolate


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